The Way It Really Was
by Rose Stetson
Summary: Helen is left with a lot to deal with after John's death in "What Might Have Been", and finds her life passing very slowly before her.
1. Alone

**The Way It Really Was**

_Sequel to "What Might Have Been"_

_Two Months after Druitt's Death:_

Weary. That was the only word Dr. Helen Magnus could use to describe herself these days. It wasn't just the swollen ankles, morning sickness, and overall exhaustion of her pregnancy, but it was also a spiritual weariness of life and her inability to find any semblance of a happily ever after. It was strange, she knew, for a woman of her age and experience to want a happily ever after, but there was still a small childish part of her that wanted the fairy tale where she could live with her loved ones and continue her life's mission. If she'd found herself desperate to find a cure for her longevity before, she was almost ten times more willing to do so now. But that expedition would need to wait until after she gave birth.

Again, she thought somewhat sadly.

Where was her daughter? She asked herself, sadly. Dead. Where was her lover? Also dead. And where did she wish to be every night when she went to sleep in the coldness of the night when loneliness was her only companion? With them.

The irony was that this physical weariness had led her to feel human for the first time in a long time.

That's what happened when one rarely contracted disease, she thought to herself as she sat down at her desk, preparing to return to her work.

Suddenly, she heard a silver tray touch the cherry desk beside her. She looked up to find the Sasquatch that Henry had affectionately nicknamed "Big Guy" bringing her a breakfast tray.

"You need to keep your strength up, Helen." He said in a paradoxically gruff, but tender, voice.

She sighed as she looked at the tray. A cup of tea and biscuits as well as a small bowl of fruit were all that it carried along with a few sprigs of lavender. Her favorite flower.

"Thank you." She said, looking back at him with a strained smile. "You've always taken such good care of me."

He nodded, modestly.

She sighed as she looked down at her burgeoning stomach. If Ashley had still been here, they'd have been able to shop together for her unexpected, yet necessary, maternity wardrobe. It wasn't something they did often with their many responsibilities, but her daughter, as tough as she'd tried to be on the outside, was as feminine on the inside as Helen was on the outside, and there were times when a carefree shopping trip had been the only cure for the loneliness experienced by both "modern" women.

It was as if someone had pierced her heart with a knife at the sudden memory of her daughter.

She would have to shop alone from now on. Unless she bore another daughter. She thought about the other women who had worked with the Sanctuary. Clara would never have been able to substitute for Ashley, but she'd been far more approachable than Kate. At least, that had been the case there at the end.

She sighed. Perhaps she would simply order the clothes on the internet to save herself the trouble and misery of shopping alone.

That was one of the many things that she'd never expected to say in her lifetime.

"Is there anything I can do to help you?" The "big guy" asked before he left.

"Not right now." She said, shaking her head. "But I appreciate the offer."

He nodded again as he left.

Tears welled up in her eyes as she sat alone in her study. Damn this accursed longevity and the loneliness it brought as a natural companion, she thought to herself.

There was a soft rap at the door, and she quickly wiped at her tears before she looked over to find Dr. Will Zimmerman. "How may I help you, Will?" She asked, forcing a smile to her lips.

"Henry said we got a call from the local police force about something strange. He said he tried to let you know about it, but that the line was busy."

Her brow furrowed before she remembered that she'd taken the phone off the hook earlier to preserve some semblance of solitude. "I'm sorry." She said, shaking her head. "I suppose I forgot to return the receiver to its cradle."

"Magnus, are you okay?" He asked, studying her closely as she quickly rectified the situation with a small sigh.

"I will be fine." She assured. "But perhaps you should take Kate and try to see what you can make of this situation."

"Sure." He said, nodding somewhat hesitantly.

"I assure you, Will." She began, noticing his hesitation. "I will be perfectly fine in your absence."

"Are you sure?"

"I have everyone finding excuses to come in, and determine how well I truly am." She reminded him. "I think I will be well-taken care of."

"All right." He said, nodding. "Then, I'm off to find out what abnormal the police force has found this time."

As he left, she allowed herself to release the small sigh she'd had trapped in her breast. She felt all alone with only a fraction of her work to keep her busy.


	2. Ice Cream

_One Month Later:_

It was nearly three o'clock in the morning when Will walked into the kitchen to find Helen sitting at the table with a small pint of ice cream in one hand with a spoon in the other. She wore an ankle-length pink, quilted maternity robe that covered everything but the gentle lace neckline of her nightgown. Her dark hair was hastily, but neatly, knotted at the nape of her neck, and she looked deep in thought.

Even when she looked like she'd been unexpectedly awoken in the middle of the night, she looked perfectly put together. And perfectly Victorian in her own modern way.

"Can't sleep?" He asked, looking over at her.

She managed a small smile as she acknowledged his presence. "There is no rest for the weary." She chuckled mirthlessly.

"Yeah, I suspected as much." He said with a shrug. "So...ice cream?" He asked, noticing the pint in her hand as he walked to the fridge. "Sounds good."

"There...might not be much more left..." She said, looking a little like the cat that swallowed the canary.

"What?" He asked, puzzled.

"While the thought of eating artificially flavored frozen milk has never appealed to me before," she began with an apologetic and somewhat amused smile. "Right now, I can't seem to get enough of it."

"Ah. Cravings..." He said with a chuckle as he closed the fridge.

She threw him a pointed look, and he shrugged apologetically. "Sorry." He laughed.

"With Ashley, it was French fries." She said, somewhat reminiscently. "I never believed that I would ever taste a French fry – willingly or unwillingly - but I sent Bernie to McDonald's so often when I carried Ashley that I should have bought stock in the company."

"Ashley wanted her fried potatoes." He said with a chuckle as he sat down beside her.

"Well, she couldn't have been conscious of what I was eating, Will." She said, shaking her head. "She hadn't even been born yet."

"I know." He corrected. "I just...never mind."

"I know what you meant." She said with a faint smile.

They sat silently for a moment before Will sighed and looked at her. "This is hard for you." He said, studying her. "We can all see that."

"I don't think parenthood was ever meant to be easy."

"Single parenthood is even tougher."

She tensed as she took another bite of her ice cream. "Well, it's certainly no...cake walk, I believe is the phrase."

"It's probably even more difficult with all of the loss..."

"I would really rather not talk about that right now." She said with a sigh.

"You need to talk about it, Magnus. If you don't, one day you could just...explode..."

"What stunning imagery," she said sarcastically, giving him a pointed look.

"Sorry. You know what I mean."

She sighed. "Yes." She admitted. "I do know what you mean. But I have never actually handled grief very well. Ever."

"What do you mean?"

"When my mother died, I refused any visitors other than my father and John for a month." She said, softly. "When my father disappeared, I holed myself up in my study for three weeks...the fact that I only locked myself in my study for one week with Ashley should tell you a lot."

"When my mom died, I didn't talk to anyone at school. They asked me to see the counselor, and I just sat there." Will said with a sigh. "I just sat there, and stared at her."

Now finished with her ice cream, Helen sat back and rested a hand on her rounded stomach. "You were young, and you missed her." She whispered with the distinct sound of empathy coloring her tone.

"Yeah, but then I grew up." He said as he looked down at his hands. "And thanks to you, I remembered that the monsters under the bed aren't just myths."

She watched him closely.

"They're beings that reason like you and me."

"They truly are sentient beings with feelings of their own." Helen agreed with a sad, but proud, smile as her mind wandered to all of the creatures who depended on her.

"If you could take it all back and keep Druitt and Ashley," Will began cautiously. "Would you?"

She tensed as tears moistened her eyes. "That's the question, isn't it?" She asked, sniffling lightly. She reached into her sleeve and retrieved a handkerchief, dabbing at her eyes and nose.

"Did I say something wrong?" He asked, worriedly.

She shook her head as she twisted the linen fabric in her hands, nervously. "No. But that's been the thematic thread in my life. When John and I were in London, he began to resent my work. Only a few months ago, Dana forced me to choose between my daughter and my work."

"You did the only thing you could have done in both situations."

She shook her head. "No, Will, I didn't. I may have made the right choice, but there were other avenues."

"You're going to make yourself crazy if you keep thinking about what might have been."

"I am one-hundred and fifty-eight years old," she began with a wry smile. "And I'm going to give birth to another child fathered by the most infamous serial killer of my day." She sighed. "I think I've already passed the threshold of crazy."

He managed an appreciative smile, and she exhaled loudly. "I should go back to my quarters."

"Want a hand?" He asked, offering her help.

She gave him a grateful smile as she accepted his hand. He helped her out of the chair, and she reached for the empty carton. "Thank you, Will. For listening."

"You're welcome, Magnus." He said, sincerely.

She smiled softly before she threw the ice cream carton away. "Good night, Will."


	3. Ultrasound

_Three Weeks Later:_

Helen stood in the video conference room, looking at the screen. "Declan, I know it probably goes without saying, but now that the UK Sanctuary is ready for its reopening, I would like you to take James's place as the official head of the UK sanctuary."

"Thank you, Helen." He said, graciously.

"There's nothing for which to thank me." She assured with a small smile. "You received this post because of the good work you have done for the entire network in the last few months."

"It was no more than anyone else." He assured.

"You're too modest, Declan." She said with a chuckle. "I will arrange another video conference with the entire Sanctuary Global Network in one week or so, and we will discuss the rest of our efforts for reconstruction."

"I look forward to your call then." He said with a smile.

"Good-bye, Declan." She said as she prepared to go offline.

"Good-bye, Helen." He said with a slight wave.

She turned off the feed, fingering the ties that cinched the tan maternity cardigan as closed as it could be with her rounded stomach. A network of five sanctuaries had been reduced to three – almost four – in less than two days thanks to the Cabal. And they had used her oldest daughter to accomplish their fiendish desires.

She looked down at her stomach. "Your sister would have been so excited to see you." She whispered as she placed a warm and loving hand on it. "You should have seen her with the nubbins. It was the softest and most maternal as I've seen her. She would have taken such good care of you."

She swallowed as she remembered how much like her father Ashley had been. "Your father asked me once if I ever wanted to have another child. It was after Ashley had died, and about the time I thought you were coming along." She whispered, tears pooling in her eyes. "And I didn't know what to say until now." She managed a small smile. "I am so grateful that you're coming into my life. You're coming into a fairly humble life given recent events, but like your sister before you, you have given my life a richer and fuller meaning than I could ever have anticipated before I became a mother."

She inhaled deeply as she sat down and pressed her other hand against her stomach. "You are growing rather quickly, little one." She announced somewhat affectionately before she sobered. "Almost...too quickly..."

Fear tugged at her heart. She bit her lip as she stood. Perhaps, she would use the equipment in her lab to double-check on the health of her child.

She walked out of the video conference room, and down the corridor. There were so many memories trapped here. Ashley had taken her first steps in the study. She'd met John in that same study over a hundred years earlier.

"Doc!" Henry cried, shaking her from her reverie.

She paused and turned to look behind her. "Henry." She said with a sober smile as he caught up to her. "What do you need?"

"I thought maybe you'd look at something I made, and tell me if you'd be willing to let the teams go out with it."

"Henry, you always invent wonderful aids for our work." She assured. "I'm sure it will be wonderful."

"Yeah, but can you still come see it?" He asked, hopefully.

She inhaled before she nodded. "I was heading to the lab as we speak."

"Sweet!"

She smiled softly as they walked to the elevator. "What is this device called, Henry?" She asked as she leaned forward and pressed the right button.

"It's...The Annihilator." He announced with great finesse.

She raised an eyebrow, somewhat amused. "The Annihilator?"

"Yeah." He said with a grin. "For those abnormals that don't want to come with us."

"I see." She said, nodding.

"Okay, fine, we can change the name." He said as they reached their stop. "It's just so much cooler than something as numerical as...AK47 or something like that."

"I'll keep that in mind," she chuckled as she followed him to his lab.

-

It was nearly two hours before she could make it back to the infirmary. She felt somewhat foolish as she wheeled out the ultrasound equipment. It would be particularly strange if someone came to the infirmary and found her running her own ultrasound.

Perhaps she needed to find a medical assistant.

She grimaced. Maybe she just needed to become a normal human again.

She shook her head. The health of her unborn child came before anyone's perceptions of her actions. And, if nothing else, her peace of mind was vital to that end.

She gently rolled the ultrasound equipment to the reclining table in the corner. She situated herself on the table before gently pulling up the hem of her shirt, and pushing down the elastic of her maternity slacks. Her belly was fully revealed, and she reached for the gel which she squirted onto her bare stomach.

She tensed slightly at the coldness of the gel. Even when she was performing the ultrasound on herself, the gel was cold. She made a mental note to either purchase or invent some sort of warmer that would keep the gel from being too cold for her live patients.

She reached over and turned on the monitor before she laid her head back on the pillow as she quickly spread the gel with the ultrasound wand. A rapid whooshing sound met her ear as she heard the heart beat of her baby, and she listened to it with the training of a physician. Something was wrong, she could tell instantly. There was some sort of echo that shouldn't be there in a healthy fetus.

When she'd covered enough of her stomach in the gel, she looked back at the screen with a fearful eye. "Please be all right," she whispered as she looked for signs of congenital heart defects.

She would have given everything to have John sit beside her and tell her everything would be all right. She swallowed down emotion as she looked away from the screen. That was never going to happen. He was dead.

She sighed as she tried to release the emotion from her thoughts. Her baby was possibly in danger, and as a physician and as a mother, she had a responsibility to protect it while it was inside her.

She looked back at the screen and began to move the wand around her belly slowly. Blurry shapes passed the screen, and she studied it closely. A leg. Another leg.

Her eyes widened as she noticed yet another pair of legs.

Tears stained her cheeks as she realized the reason for the echo. She was carrying twins. A boy and a girl from the look of it.

"We're having twins, John." She whispered. "Wherever you are...if you can still hear me...we're going to have twins."

The silence was all too deafening, and she leaned back on the examination table and cried.


	4. John

"_Helen."_

_The voice was intoxicating, filling her mind with hazy memories of the distant past almost like jumbled scenes from a movie.  
_

"_Helen. Wake up." The husky voice invited._

_She opened her eyes to find herself lying in the comfort of her bed. She smiled softly as she saw John watching protectively over her. "John."_

_He leaned in and kissed her gently as he ran his fingers through her carefully curled hair._

"_My Helen." He said, affectionately, as he pulled away._

"_I had the most terrible dream." She admitted as she sat up._

"_That I was dead?" He asked, touching her hand gently._

_She nodded. "It was awful. I was all alone. You were gone. Ashley was gone...I'd lost everyone I'd ever cared for."_

"_You're not alone, Helen." He said, shaking her head. "Lonely, perhaps, but never alone."_

_She looked down at her stomach as his words washed over her. She looked back at him after a moment. "It wasn't a dream, was it?" She asked, sadly._

"_No, Helen." He said, shaking his head. "It wasn't a dream. This...this is the dream."_

_She closed her eyes as tears welled up in her eyes. "Why, John?" She managed, emotionally. "Why are you here?"_

"_Because you called to me, Helen." He said, touching her rounded belly. "You called to me and asked if I could hear you."_

_She placed her own hand on top of his with a faint smile._

"_I can hear you, Helen." He said as he touched his finger to her chin and forced her to look up at him. "I may be dead, but I'm not gone."_

"_Will asked me after Ashley's death what I thought of death." She said, looking at him. "I told him that it wasn't something you were supposed to understand..."_

"_You want to know what it's like." He said, looking over at her. "The scientist in you is curious."  
_

_She shook her head. _"_I just want to know that you and Ashley are all right."  
_

"_We are." He assured. "And I'm watching out for her just like you would if you were here."_

"_I know." She said, gratefully._

_He was silent for a moment, looking at her rounded belly, before he looked back up at her. "Twins, Helen." He said, shaking his head._

_She nodded somewhat nervously._

"_I never could have hoped to have even one child," He said, overcome with joy at the prospect of his impending fatherhood. "Not after all that I put you through."_

_She closed her eyes in pain at the memory of the lonely nights she'd endured during her pregnancy without these apparitions to give her comfort._

_"Yet after all of that, you have given me three of the most wondrous children I could ever have hoped for."  
_

"_Not yet." She said, looking down at her stomach again. "We still have to wait several months for these two."  
_

"_I wish I could help you, Helen." He said with a sigh. "I wish I could be here to support you."_

_She swallowed as she closed her eyes. "Please, John..."_

_"I may not be here physically, but __I am watching you, Helen. I will not leave you alone, and I will protect you the way I should have for the entirety of your life."_

_She teared up and took his hand into her own. "I miss you, John." She whispered softly._

"_I know, Helen. And I miss you desperately."_

"_I wish I hadn't injected myself with the source blood." She whispered as tears of regret fell down her cheeks. "I wish I wasn't cursed with this longevity. I wish we'd lived out our days in England as we'd planned, ignorant of the fate which might have befallen us if we'd taken that final risk."_

"_You have a mission, Helen." He said, gently wiping the tears from her cheeks. "And your abilities are a large part of it."_

_She looked at him, feeling lost and afraid. He offered her a reassuring smile. "I promise that I will be waiting when God wills it your time to go."_

"_You're going to stay with me?" She asked, looking over at him._

_He nodded. "You may not be able to see me, but I will never be far."_

"_Do you swear it?"_

_He nodded. "I vow with the depth of my affection for you, Helen." He assured. _

_A tiny part of her wondered how reliable his vow was. After all, he'd made a promise once...and then all hell had broken loose._

_"I once promised to make you happy, Helen." He said, looking deeply into her eyes. "For all of eternity."_

_She tensed as the memory of his proposal washed over her. Not long after that night, he'd become the Ripper who had despised everything to do with her and who had later plotted murderously to use their daughter as a hostage for a vial of her blood._

"_It's about time I kept that promise, don't you agree?" He asked, sensing the depths of her thoughts._

_Tears welled up in her eyes. "John." She whispered, emotionally._

_He wrapped his arms around her and offered the comfort she so desperately required as she cried for her lost innocence and the pain of utter devastation.  
_


	5. Doctor's Visit

_One week later:_

"Have you been taking it easy, Helen?" Her friend and obstetrician, Dr. Luke Patterson, said as he took her blood pressure.

"Are you going to lecture me every time I invite you into my home?" She asked, raising an eyebrow wryly.

"Only when you have high blood pressure." He said, seriously.

"What?" She asked, surprised. "No. I'm fine."

"You might be." He nodded. "And you might not be. I'm going to keep an eye on you."

"I'm not doing anything differently than I did with Ashley."

He sighed as he looked at her. "Helen, that was twenty-five years ago, and this time, you're carrying twins. You can't do everything the same way."

"Twenty-five years for me is not like it is for other women." She said, looking at him seriously. "You know that."

"Yes, I do." He said, nodding. "But it's still not nothing."

She bit her lip. "I run a global network of Sanctuaries. I can't just...fritter around..."

"I never asked you to fritter, Helen." He said, seriously. "But I did ask you to take it easy. Sleep in. Get a good breakfast. Take a walk. Read a novel."

She sighed. "I don't particularly like fiction."

"You cannot relax properly if you read something for work."

"My work is my life." She protested.

"Not anymore. Those twins are your life." He said, seriously.

She sighed as she finally nodded. "All right. I'll...try to "take it easy"."

"I'm leaving my number with all of your staff with instructions to call me if you're doing anything contrary to my instructions."

"I have self-discipline, thank you very much." She assured.

"I know." He said, nodding. "But...this is a little insurance."

"You're all exasperating!" She cried as she heaved herself off the couch.

"And you're as stubborn as a mule, Helen." He said, shaking his head. "Be careful, or I might just invite myself to stay until you give birth."

She sighed. "All right. I'll try not to get irritated with everyone's overprotective paranoia."

"That would be wise." He said with an amused smile. "I'll see you next week."

"Next week?" She asked, surprised.

He nodded. "Yep. I told you I'd be keeping a close eye on you."

She sighed before she nodded. "All right...next week, then."

"I'll see myself out." He said, walking out of the lab as she sighed.

Will stood just outside the door, discreetly, and walked with the doctor out of Helen's earshot.

"Something I can help you with?" Luke asked, looking over at Will.

Will sighed. "I was walking past and heard something about high blood pressure."

"She's too stubborn to relax." He said with a sigh.

"How bad is it really?"

"Well, it could be a minor inconvenience fixed with her taking it easy, or it could be more serious..."

"Preeclampsia?"

"You've done your homework."

He shrugged. "Magnus is important to what we do here. I just...we want to take care of her as well as she's taken care of us."

"Keep thinking that way, and she'll be all right." He assured. "Call me if something happens."

"I will." He said, nodding.


	6. Weary

_Two weeks later:_

"Legends say that the site is guarded by an abnormal." Helen said, using the remote in her hand to activate a slide change to a picture of a composite creature which was part lion, part goat, and part serpent. "_Feroxdynatos Chimerus._" She said, professionally. "Or in other words – Chimera."

Kate's eyes widened at the prospect of what that creature would be worth on the black market though she refrained from speculating.

"Chimera. That's real?" Will asked, surprised.

"That's what we're going to...find..." Helen began as she blinked several times. The room seemed so blurry, and she felt so warm...

"Magnus?" Will asked, studying her.

"I'm fine." She said, shaking her head. "I just...I have something in my eye." She said, blinking a few more times before she finally shook it off. "Where was I? Oh yes. We don't know for sure whether or not _Feroxdynatos Chimerus_ is real, but legends have often correctly predicted the location of an abnormal, even if what we find is not quite as the legends suggest."

"So, this chimera thingie is not necessarily what it appears to be..." Kate said, huskily.

"That's correct." Helen nodded.

"Anything else we need to know about it?"

"According to the legends," Helen began as she sat back down in her seat at the conference table. "The _Feroxdynatos Chimerus_ has been known to breathe fire, but that has been unverified as of yet."

"Is that possible?" Henry asked, looking over at a flushed Helen.

"I would have to study the abnormal to determine its fire-breathing capacity." She said as she shrugged off her maternity suit jacket.

"Maybe we should finish this in a couple of hours." Will suggested, studying Helen.

"Will, I'm fine." She assured as she shook her head.

"Magnus, you don't look so well." He said, trying to be discreet. "Maybe we can take a break for lunch, and then we finish..."

She pressed a hand to her upper abdomen with a grimace as she took a deep breath. "Perhaps you're right, Will." She said after a moment as she nodded. "We'll reconvene at two o'clock."

The others exited quickly, but she sat there, closing her eyes for a moment. She felt so tired. And warm. So warm.

"Magnus?"

She opened her eyes and looked back over at Will. "Yes?"

"Lunch?"

"Go on ahead. I'll be there in a few minutes."

"Are you sure?"

She nodded. "I just want to...rest...for a few minutes..."

"I can bring something back if you want."

"Ham and swiss on whole wheat with honey mustard please."

"No problem."

"And if it's not too much trouble, please toast the sandwich."

"Got it. Toasted ham and swiss on whole wheat with honey mustard."

"Do we have any grapes?"

"Probably. And if not, I can get some."

"With a side of grapes then." She said, closing her eyes again.

"Something to drink?"

"Just water. With a little lemon."

"Ice?"

She opened her eyes as she shook her head. "No, thank you. That's an American custom."

He chuckled. "Water. Lemon. No ice."

"Thank you, Will." She said with a small smile as she closed her eyes again.


	7. Trouble

_She walked back to her study after eating the meal that Will had brought her. It was time to get some more work done without the paranoid eyes of her team._

_A figure emerged from the shadows of her study as she walked in the door. "Helen," John greeted with an affectionate smile._

"_John," she cried, surprised._

"_You're trying to overwork yourself again." He said with a faint rebuke in his voice._

"_There's so much to be done, John." She said, pushing past him to her desk._

"_And there's only one thing that only you can do." He said, following her. "Only you can give our children the fighting chance that they deserve."_

_She sighed. "Must you join their side?"_

"_Whose side, Helen?" He asked with raised eyebrows. "I thought I was on your side."_

"_I know when I am overworking myself and when I'm perfectly fine."_

"_Blurry vision? Upper abdominal pain?" He asked, listing her symptoms. "That sounds like preeclampsia."_

_She tensed before she sighed and sat down. "I know."_

"_Why don't you take a few days off before Luke puts you on bedrest?" He suggested._

"_And just throw my work into the hands of the Cabal?" She protested._

"_Helen, you are a necessary part of the Sanctuary, but no one is indispensable." He said, sternly. "Especially for a few days. Haven't you left the Sanctuary periodically in young William's hands?"_

"_Yes, but that was not when we were in the process of reconstruction."_

"_Helen, promise me that you will take the next three days to rest." He pleaded softly as he knelt before her and took her hand in his own._

_She saw the vulnerability in his eyes, and she finally nodded. "Very well, John. I will rest."_

"_Thank you, my darling." He said, kissing her hand affectionately._

_He touched her stomach with a faint smile before he leaned up and kissed her lips. "You've made me so wonderfully happy, Helen." He said, gazing into the depths of her blue eyes._

-

"Magnus?"

"John..." Helen murmured from where she sat asleep in the armchair.

"Magnus." Will tried again.

"Don't go, John." She whispered.

Will touched her shoulder, and her eyes snapped open. "Will..." She cried in surprise.

"I brought your lunch."

"My lunch?"

"Yeah. You must have fallen asleep while I went to get it." He said, sitting beside her. "Maybe you should go take a nap in your quarters."

"The fact that I just awoke from a rest would suggest that I don't need another." She said, absently.

He opened his mouth to retort, but she spoke before he could. "Still, you're right. I should take my sandwich, eat it in my room, and rest."

"You're not going to fight me?" He asked, surprised.

She shook her head. "You were right. I am weary." She handed him a file folder. "These were my notes on _Feroxdynatos Chimerus._ You should be able to finish the briefing."

"Wait...what?" He asked, shocked.

"I have grown increasingly weary over the last several days, and I believe it would be wise if I took the next few days to rest." She explained. "Do you think you could keep an eye on the Sanctuary until I return in three days?"

"Uh...sure..." He stammered.

"Thank you." She said, heaving herself out of the chair.

"Do you want us to call Dr. Patterson?" He asked, knowing that she didn't take time off if something wasn't really bothering her physically or emotionally.

She shook her head. "A few days' rest will do me all the good I need." She assured.

"If you say so."

"I am a doctor and it's my body." She chuckled as she picked up her lunch. "I think I know what will do me good."

"Just don't...take any chances." He said, seriously. "You're important to how things go around here, and we're all kind of excited about those kids you're carrying..."

"Yes, I suppose it's about time that something good happened around here for a change." She said with a haunted smile. She inhaled and exhaled slowly, looking down at her stomach for a moment before she looked back at him. "I will be in my quarters if anyone requires anything of me."

"Okay..." He said, more concerned about her than he'd been in the past. Something was wrong with the great Helen Magnus, and she was closing down rather than opening up. He'd give her a few hours to herself before he went to press her for more information on her physical and emotional health.


	8. Pain

Helen's eyes fluttered open as she began to awaken from her two-hour rest. As she did, she stared up at the wooden canopy that covered her Victorian four-poster bed. She sighed as she let one hand fall above her head onto hair while the other rested on her extended abdomen as she left her feet elevated on several pillows to reduce the swelling in her ankles.

She'd spent so many sleepless nights here, staring at the wooden top of her bed.

"Ashley..." She whispered. "I know you're gone, but I once called for your father, and he came to me in a dream and told me that he could hear me." She sighed. "Perhaps I imagined that just like I imagined seeing you after your memorial service..."

There was no response, and truth be told, Helen wasn't sure that she hadn't expected one.

She sighed as she looked back at the top of her bed. "I remember when you a junior in high school," she began with a faint, and somewhat sad, smile. "You'd gone to your first prom, and you'd had your heart broken by your date."

She swallowed. "When you had come home, you knocked on my door, and I invited you to lay with me on the bed. And for the first time since you'd become a teenager, we didn't fight. We had a conversation as one woman to another."

Helen looked over to the other side of the bed, almost hoping to find her daughter there, but she found herself alone. She sighed once more before she looked at her stomach. "It's probably time for me to realize that your father and sister are gone." She whispered. "And that from now on, it will just be the three of us."

She wrapped her arms around her stomach as she tried to imagine how she'd manage to do this again – times two.

"I guess I can admit that I'm a little nervous while you're still unborn." She said with a small smile. "I had a century to acclimate to your sister's arrival, and I have only a few more months to acclimate to yours."

She looked back up at the canopy. "Let's see...with Ashley, I sent her to public school, but I didn't have as many enemies back then as I have now – in part because of Ashley..." She finally had to admit with an affectionate smile. "Anyhow, I probably won't send you to public school. I'll find you a tutor, and you can take your lessons here."

She sighed as she thought of the twins' earlier years – from infancy to preschool. "I should probably search for a new team member who can perform the medical duties which I have performed. And I will have to search for someone who can help me take care of you both."

She swallowed as she realized she was back to the same dilemma that Dana had thrust upon her. _Your work or your daughter._

"I love my job," she admitted. "But I will never allow you to feel neglected by or alienated from me. I promise you that."

She thought about her work, and she smiled. "I promise that I will show you a world you could never have imagined."

She sighed for a moment. "We've gotten all of about three hours of our mandatory seventy-two out of the way. What shall we do for the rest of the time?"

She moved her feet off the pillows, sat up, and looked around her room. She'd never been one for needlepoint like her mother or literature like John. She'd been too much like her father, who had worked around the clock since before she could remember.

"Perhaps I should prepare for your arrival." She said with a sigh. "Although, I am unsure whether or not shopping will be considered an acceptably restful activity..."

She swung her legs over the side of the bed before she rolled onto her side in an effort to get out of bed. "Let's try to find you some of those things that you're going to need when you come into this world."

-

"Magnus!" Will cried as she returned to the Sanctuary, carrying two small bags while 'the Big Guy' carried several more substantial bags behind her.

"Yes, Will?" She asked, looking over at him somewhat wearily. Her feet and back ached from all of the walking she'd done.

He took the bags from her. "What did you do?" He asked, staring at all the packages. "Raid the mall?"

"For your information, I have not had any infants' things in my home since Ashley was born." She said with a slight snap to her tone. "And seeing that I am more than halfway through my pregnancy and on a self-imposed stand-down, I determined that some shopping was in order."

"Oh..." He said, sufficiently chastised. "Sorry."

"It's all right." She said, continuing down the corridor. "What do you need?"

"There was a minor incident..."

She turned back to look at him. "Excuse me?"

"Kate dropped something; Henry cut himself..."

"And you don't know how to apply a simple bandage?"

"I think he needs stitches..." He said with a slight grimace.

"Oh." She said, nodding. "Well then, if you will help bring my parcels to my quarters, I will tend to Henry's injury."

"No problem." He said, seriously.

She continued down the hallway before suddenly leaning against the wall as she pressed a hand to the side of her abdomen. She bit her lip as a moan ripped from her throat. "Oh..."

"Magnus?" Will asked, dropping the bags and hurrying to her side.

"Pain..." She managed, closing her eyes as she tried to breathe regularly.

"Abdominal pain?" He asked, confused.

"Sudden onset." She managed as she nodded. "Call Luke!"

She slid down the wall until she sat on the floor, clutching the fabric on the right side of her abdomen as she pressed the back of her head against the wall in pain.

Will nearly tripped over his own feet as he hurried to the study to make the phone call.

Helen's manservant and resident Sasquatch knelt beside her, offering a hand to her. She clutched it as she clenched her teeth and tried to bear the pain.

"My babies." She whispered, fearfully as the initial knife-like pain gave way to fear and dull discomfort. "Dear God, what's going to happen to my babies?"


	9. Bedrest

"I've given her a sedative." Luke said, exiting her quarters. "She's resting now."

"What's going on?" Will asked, his arms folded across his chest seriously.,

"She seems to be suffering from preeclampsia." He said with a sigh. "I'll know more when I get some tests back from the lab, but the symptoms she's been describing – headaches, sharp pain on the right side of her abdomen, blurry vision, and a rather dramatic weight gain over the last couple of weeks - they're pure preeclampsia."

"What's the treatment?"

"Well, for now, we can try bedrest. But if it doesn't get under control soon, I'll probably have to deliver the twins early."

"Isn't that dangerous?"

"It's certainly less dangerous for a pregnancy to progress past the 37-week mark, but when a mother is over 35 and carrying multiples like Helen, it's more probable that she'll deliver early."

"Over thirty-five..." He said, skeptically.

"In Helen's case...it's somewhat metaphorical." He said with a sigh. "But in any case, there are still a lot of strikes against her."

"The stress of losing Ashley..." Will began.

"And John..." He continued.

"Reconstructing the Sanctuary Global Network..."

"And wondering how she's going to balance all of the balls she has in the air right now with the twins when they arrive." Luke said, understandingly.

"What can we do to help her?"

"Well, first of all, you might want to find some way to support her on bed rest. Find some way to keep her involved, but not too involved."

"Keep her from stressing about what's going on, but also keep her from stressing about what might be going on..." Will said, understanding the doctor's suggestion.

"Tough, I know, but I'm sure you'll come up with something." He said, apologetically.

"Thank you, Doctor." Will said, escorting him out the door.

Henry, Kate, and "The Big Guy" stood in the foyer, awaiting some sort of news about Helen's condition.

"The doctor says that she's probably got a condition called preeclampsia. He's prescribed bed rest to see if that helps."

"And if it doesn't?" Kate asked, more willing to ask the question on everyone's mind.

"We'll cross that bridge if we get to it." He said, soberly.

-

"_Mom?" Ashley asked, entering the study._

"_Ashley." She greeted with a smile as she finished up her work._

_Ashley inhaled as she watched her mother hurry around the office. "Mom, I need to talk to you about something."_

_Helen looked at her daughter before she set aside the papers. "All right. I'm all yours."_

_Ashley bit the inside of her cheek before she finally looked up at her. "You need to stop."_

"_Stop what, Ashley?" Helen asked, surprised._

"_Running around like your work is the only thing standing between you and whatever you're afraid of."_

_Helen shook her head. "I am merely a busy woman." She corrected._

"_Then why haven't you taken a few days off since I was born?"_

"_Because there was a lot to do in that time, Ashley." She reiterated. "If I hadn't had a vision of where I wanted the Sanctuary network to go and the drive to make it happen, we wouldn't be where we are today."_

"_I know." Ashley said, softly. "But now you have another chance, and I don't want you to screw it up."_

"_What are you talking about?"_

"_You're working so hard because you're afraid to feel the pain of losing me and Dad." She said. Her tone was that of a wise and insightful woman._

"_That's rubbish." Helen said, shaking her head._

"_Is it?" Ashley asked, raising an eyebrow in confrontation. "Your doctor had to sedate you so that you and the twins would get the rest you need."_

_Helen inhaled and exhaled again. She'd been caught._

"_You miss me, but the biggest thing you don't want think about is Dad, isn't it?" She asked, looking at her mother seriously._

"_You don't know what you're talking about, Ashley." She said, trying to hide the tears which pricked at her eyes._

"_No?"_

"_Your father...destroyed me...when he first left me..."_

"_I know."_

"_No, Ashley, you don't know." She said, softly. "For years, I contemplated taking my own life. Without my work, I never would have survived that time." She sighed. "It wasn't just your father who had dark days."_

"_Trust me, Mom, I figured that out a while ago."_

"_How?"_

"_You never had a boyfriend for longer than a few months – even if they were the nicest guys in the world."_

"_My love life is further complicated by the fact that I am at least one-hundred years older than all of my lovers." She pointed out._

"_True, but you just said Dad devastated you when he first left." She said, unwilling to back down from asking the hard questions. "And you never admitted how his death affected you now."_

"_It was difficult." She said, eying her daughter steadily. "But not entirely unexpected."_

"_His death? Or the fact that he abandoned you again?" Ashley pressed._

_Helen tensed and inhaled sharply._

"_That's what I thought." Ashley said with a sober smile._

"_Ashley..."_

"_Mom, you didn't just save me for the 20__th__ century to protect me from Dad." She said, softly. "You saved me because you didn't want to have to look me in the eye and see a piece of him everyday."_

_Helen swallowed in shame. "I haven't been proud of everything I ever did, but Ashley, I swear to you – you were never one of those regrets."_

"_Then stop treating my baby brother and sister like they are." She said, softly. "Do everything you can to keep them safe and healthy like you did for me."_

Helen's eyes opened suddenly with a gasp as she felt someone touch her arm.

"Dinner." Her manservant offered, placing the tray beside her on the bed.

"Oh..." She said, breathing more easily now. "Thank you."

"You're welcome."

She took a few deep breaths as she sat up in bed, and he looked at her worriedly. "Bad dream?"

"Somewhat." She admitted with a tense smile.

"Wanna talk about it?"

"Not particularly, no." She said, shaking her head with an almost sick look on her face.

"All right." He said, placing the tray on her slowly diminishing lap.

"Thank you for bringing my meal to me." She said, changing the subject. "I wouldn't be able to do this without you."

"It was no trouble." He said with a shrug.

"It still means a great deal to me." She said with a grateful smile.

He nodded in gruff acknowledgment of her gratitude. "Do you need anything else?"

She shook her head. "No, thank you."

He snorted a few times before he walked out of her quarters and headed back to his other duties.

Her thoughts drifted to Ashley's last few words: _"Then stop treating my baby brother and sister like they are."_

She looked down at her stomach and sighed. "Ashley's right." She whispered. "I've been treating you like an unwelcome burden when you should be a wondrous joy."

She inhaled deeply and exhaled through her mouth. "I will try to do better." She promised. "You have my word."

She remembered her vast library of books. More than a few had been gifts from John, and right now, she could use the tangible testament to his existence.

She went to get out of the bed, but she paused and slipped back under the sheets. She needed to come up with some system of getting the things she wished to have before she had the Sanctuary turned upside down with people going to and fro as they tried to meet her needs.

There was a knock on her door, and she pulled her robe further around her. "Come in," she called as she finished freshening up as well as she could have been.

"Hey," Will said as he walked into the room. "How are you feeling?"

"Better." She admitted.

"Good." He said, nodding. "Can I get something for you?"

"A book, actually." She laughed softly.

"Oh? Which one?"

"_Great Expectations_." She said, softly. "It was John's favorite Dickens, and he gave me his first-edition copy before he went mad."

"Ah. I'll get it." He said, turning.

"You needn't leave now." She said, shaking her head. "The company would be just as welcome."

He sat down on the bed beside her. "Getting restless already?"

She shook her head with a small smile. "How are operations?"

"Everything's running smoothly. The residents are happy, everyone's good...you're the only one who was worrying us."

"Well, I'm fine now." She said, managing an amused smile.

"Yep." He said, noticing the dinner tray. "Hey...you should eat this."

"I will." She assured. "I was simply waking when it came in."

He nodded. "Right."

She bit her lip for a moment before she looked over at him. "What's your professional opinion about dreams?"

"Depends on the dream." He said, somewhat intrigued by her question.

She tensed for a moment before she continued. "I've been...seeing things..."

"Druitt? Ashley?"

"In my dreams, yes." She said, nodding.

"Well, that doesn't make you crazy..."

"Do you believe they're out there?" She asked after a moment. "Spirits...watching over us?"

"I think I already asked you this question..."

"Not exactly." She said with a faintly amused smile. "You asked me what death was, and I basically told you that I didn't know what it was, and that I didn't want to speculate. Now, I'm asking you if you believe there might be spirits..."

"Well, it wouldn't surprise me." He said with a shrug. "I mean, there's a Bigfoot serving as your manservant, you have a mermaid in your basement, and you think a few ghosts would surprise me?"

She wrapped her arms around her belly as they rested on her lap. "I suppose it wouldn't be quite a stretch to believe in some form of alternate dimension into which spirits cross over after death."

"Exactly." He said, nodding. He stood. "I should get back. But I'll send Henry up with your book, okay?"

She nodded. "Thank you."

"Why _Great Expectations_?" He asked, turning after a moment.

Helen smiled softly in memory. "John related most with Pip's character...unlike James Watson, Nigel Griffin and I, Nicola and John were not born into privilege. And unlike Nicola, who charmed his way up the ranks, John had to work hard. He read every book he could lay his hands on, and he imitated the gentlemen whom he saw until he was accepted to the university, and he was brought under the tutelage of my father." She swallowed. "The rest of the transformation, I suppose, was as a result of my infatuation with him. I suppose he became my personal Eliza Doolittle..."

Will smiled at the reference to _My Fair Lady_.

"I think he held a bitter resentment to what I was trying to help him become. Like Pip at the end of _Great Expectations_." She said after a moment. "It's strange how literary John's life was. With irony at every turn and passion in great abundance."

Will bit the inside of his cheek as he realized she'd zoned off into her own little world. "I'm going to get that book for you now, Magnus..."

"Thank you, Will." She said, absently.

Gods, she missed John desperately.


	10. Henry

There was a knock on the door as Henry opened the door. "Doc?"

"Henry." She said with a smile as she wiped her mouth with a napkin, having finished her dinner.

"I brought your book." He said, walking into the room.

"Thank you."

He walked over to the bed and put the volume on the nightstand beside her bed. "How are you feeling?'

"Better." She assured as she patted the bed beside her. "And you?"

"Me?"

"Will said you'd injured yourself and suggested you might need stitches..."

"Oh, that..." He said, putting his hands in his back pockets somewhat nervously. "The Big Guy took me to the ER."

"Let me see." She insisted.

He pulled his hand out and offered it to her. "Seven stitches..." She counted, studying the wound. "They're not as precise as I would have hoped. You'll have a scar..."

"There are worse things." He said with a shrug.

"I suppose." She said, nodding. "Please, sit down and visit for a moment."

"Okay." He said, sitting beside her as he inhaled slowly.

"Pain?" She asked, looking over at him. "I can have someone retrieve some ibuprofen."

"I'm fine." He assured. "How are you?"

"You already asked me that." She said with a small half-smile.

"Right."

She watched him closely. He was quiet and melancholy. Something was wrong. "Is something on your mind?"

He swallowed. "I was worried..." He admitted. "We were all worried."

"I'm sorry I troubled you." She said, apologetically as she looked down at her stomach which housed her unborn children.

"Look, Doc, with all that's happened lately..." He paused and sighed before he looked at her with watery eyes. "Just...take care of yourself, okay?"

"I will," she promised, recognizing how difficult the last few months had been on him. "Do you want to talk about her?"

"Who? Ashley?" He asked, looking back at her.

She nodded. "You two were very close."

He nodded. "She was like the little sister I never had."

"I'll never forget how often you tried to protect her." She said with a faint smile.

"She usually ended up protecting me," he chuckled.

She smiled appreciatively. "She inherited her father's fire, determination and tenacity."

He nodded absently. "Yeah." He looked down at her stomach for a moment before he looked back up at her. "I can tell them about her, if you want. If it would be too painful..."

"Thank you." She whispered as tears welled up in her eyes. She wiped at her cheeks, flushing in embarrassment. "I can't seem to get a hold on my tears." She laughed mirthlessly. "A single thought about either Ashley or John and I become weak and emotional."

He offered her a handkerchief. "She was your daughter, Doc. And Druitt – although not my favorite guy – he was her father. Even if you hadn't gotten back together, you'd be mourning him."

She nodded, knowing he was right. The relatively few moments of passion they'd shared with one another before his death had been a blessing, not a curse. If not for them, she would probably remember the John who had taken their daughter hostage. The John who had killed so many people in a crazed attempt to retrieve a vial of her blood. She would have refused to remember his quiet, genteel nature from their courtship. She would have refused to consider carrying another of his children.

"How did you get to be so wise?" She asked, looking over at him.

"I had a good teacher." He said, managing a small half-smile.

She gave him a grateful smile before she looked back down at his hand. "I want to see this in a few days. We don't want an infection to set in."

"And you're gonna go crazy if you're in here alone for too much longer." He teased.

"That is a distinct possibility." She smiled appreciatively.

"Look, I know you're not terribly big on television..." He said, looking over at her. "But...this might be a chance to get caught up on all of the movies you've missed over the years."

"You mean, since they first came out?" She teased.

He chuckled in amusement. "I bet that's a lot of movies..."

She smiled softly. "More than a few." She admitted.

"Maybe you can stick with the ones on DVD..." He suggested.

"And where do you think I should begin?" She asked, raising an eyebrow.

"Well, you know...my favorite movie in the whole wide world is "Monty Python and the Holy Grail"."

She rolled her eyes. "I'm sorry. I'm already lowering my standards somewhat to even consider watching a motion picture instead of a play or an opera. I am certainly not going to lower them that far."

"Oh, thanks." He laughed.

She grinned. "I like my entertainment to have a discernible plot line."

"Then, I'm out." He chuckled as he stood. "But I'll see what everyone else thinks. I bet Will has some great movies..."

She smiled. "Thank you, Henry. For the book and for the company."

"No problem, Doc." He said with a grin.


	11. Titanic

"_Helen? Helen, where are you?"_

_At the sound of John's voice, she put away her newly sterilized surgical tools and walked out of the room. "John? I'm here," she called as the bustle of her blue silk gown swished behind her. "In the examination room._

_She slipped the leather apron over her head, and her long, golden ringlets fell back to their place on her shoulder as she folded it against her expanded abdomen._

"_Helen, I have the most wonderful news!" He cried, excitedly, as he hurried toward her._

"_What?" She asked, smiling equally excitedly at the pronouncement of good news. Since her father's disappearance several months ago, she was ready for something happy._

"_They've asked me to stay on as a tenured professor at Oxford. Isn't that wonderful?"_

"_John!" She cried with a grin. "How wonderful!"_

_He bent his neck to look at her pregnant belly. "Children, can you hear it? Your father is going to be a professor at Oxford for as long as he desires!"_

_She grinned as a blond-haired young woman, dressed in a green gown much like her mother's, walked over._

"_Ashley! Your father's received a fellowship from Oxford." She announced joyfully._

"_That's wonderful, Father." Ashley said, her curled ringlets bouncing as she ran to hug her father in congratulation._

_Something was wrong, Helen thought as she watched father and daughter embrace. Something was wrong..._

_Knock-knock-knock._

"_Helen?" John asked, worriedly as he looked over at her. "Helen, are you all right?"_

She gasped as she awoke to the sound of another round of knocking. Still in the Sanctuary she loved, she realized she'd left the century of her birth and returned to the 21st century. She sighed softly as she calmed down. No wonder the dream had felt wrong – Ashley could never have been happy in that century.

"Doctor Magnus?" Kate's voice asked through the wooden door.

Helen forced herself to sit upright and reached for a hand mirror. She looked a mess, she thought to herself as she tried desperately to tame her unkempt hair. Finally, she sighed and put away the mirror. It was no use. "Come in," she said somewhat disheartened.

The door opened, and the bounty hunter walked in. "Henry told me you were interested in watching a movie..."

"Yes," Helen admitted. "I am."

"Well, I have the perfect one." She said with a grin as she walked over. She handed the DVD case to Helen, who looked up at the younger woman in surprise. "Titanic?" She asked, curiously.

"Yeah." She said with a grin. "I mean, it's like...from your time period, right?"

"My time period?" Helen asked, skeptically.

"Yeah, like...you were around for the actual Titanic disaster, weren't you?"

"As a matter of fact," Helen said, nodding. "I was the one who instructed the Captain to furnish more life boats."

"And he didn't listen..." She said with the soft click of her tongue. "Man...that sucks."

Helen looked on the back of the DVD case to find Kate's name written in magic marker. "Do you like this movie?"

Kate shifted, uncomfortably. "No, I just thought you might..."

"You do like this movie." Helen said, looking over at the young woman in knowing amusement.

"Okay, I like this movie." She said, rolling her eyes. "So what?"

"Would you like to join me?" Helen invited with an amused smile.

"I have some stuff to do..." She said, looking at the door.

"I don't need to watch it right this moment," Helen chuckled.

"Yeah...it's a mission..."

"What mission?" She asked, raising an eyebrow in curiosity. "Will already briefed me this morning. He said that there were no impending missions."

Kate looked at the more sophisticated woman before she sighed. "All right...I'll watch it with you."

"Thank you." Helen said with a victorious grin.

"So, wait...you actually told the Captain of the Titanic to put more life boats on the ship?" She asked, sitting down on the bed.

Helen nodded. "Yes. I did."

"How did you know something bad was going to happen?"

"Firstly, I'd heard it from our friend, the mermaid, downstairs."

"She's got psychic powers, right?"

"Not necessarily the way you mean." She explained, "But yes, she has a special connection with sea creatures in particular."

"Wait...what?" Kate asked, confused. "I thought it was sunk by an iceberg."

"That's what everyone believes." Helen said, cryptically.

"What really happened?"

"They sailed into a pack of abnormal sea creatures. After one of them was killed by the metal scraping across its back, they worked as a collective to bring it down."

"Damn," she cursed softly.

"Indeed." Helen said, nodding.

"So...have you seen this movie?"

"Yes. When it first came out." She said, nodding. "And quite frankly, I was disappointed."

"Really?" Kate asked in surprise.

Helen nodded. "There were so many heartbreaking stories from that particular disaster, and yet they only referenced them and fashioned their own rather ridiculous love triangle."

"So, what's your favorite movie?"

"That's a difficult question as I've been around since motion pictures were first invented." Helen said as she leaned back against the headboard of the bed. It was apparent to Kate that she considered the question carefully. "Hm...I must admit that I have a fondness for _Somewhere in Time_."

"I hated that movie!" Kate said, shaking her head. "It's so sad! And she's so much older than him!"

Helen smiled softly. "I love the message. The hope."

"Hope?" Kate asked, raising an eyebrow.

Helen nodded. "From your perspective, you see a man who's lost his will to live after he loses his love, am I right?"

She nodded vigorously. "It was so sad."

Helen nodded, understandingly. "From my perspective, I see a woman who patiently waited until she could be reunited with her love in the only place where they could ever truly be together."

Kate thought for a moment. "Huh...never thought about it that way."

Helen shrugged. "As I said...different perspectives, Kate..."

The young woman nodded slowly. "So, are we gonna watch the movie or not?"

Helen laughed softly. "I suppose we had better start it if we're going to actually watch the film today."

The twenty-three-year-old grinned as she put the DVD into the laptop and started it. Helen, in turn, scooted over to the side so that she could sit back and enjoy the movie with her.

"Oh yeah..." Kate murmured huskily.

Helen looked at the young woman with a melancholy smile as she remembered the number of times she and her daughter had taken a few hours out of their busy schedules to watch a movie much like this.

How she missed her daughter!


	12. Nikola

With a gentle knock on the door, Will stepped into the room. "Magnus?"

She looked over from where she'd been reading, the book propped on her rounded belly. "Will." She greeted as she leaned over to retrieve her bookmark. "Is something wrong?" She asked, looking up at him, seriously.

"No," he said, shaking his head. "But Henry said you were looking for movies..."

She smiled softly. "It was his idea."

"I assumed." Will chuckled. "But I brought one that I thought you might like."

"Oh?"

"Yeah. It's set at the turn of the 20th century."

"Why is everyone so damned insistent on forcing me to relive every poor recreation of the era in which I was born?" She asked, somewhat irritated.

"It's gone." He said, hiding the movie behind his back.

"I'm sorry." She said, shaking her head. "Being in this bed all day has made more than a little ill-tempered. Which film did you bring with you?"

"The Prestige." He said, offering the case to her.

"To be perfectly frank," she admitted. "This is one of the films from the last decade which I have desired to see."

"It's a good one." He said, earnestly.

"Very well." She said with a small smile. "I shall view it when I have finished the chapter of my book."

"_Great Expectations_?"

She shook her head. "No. I finished that several days ago."

"Which one are you reading right now?"

"_Wuthering Heights_."

"That's awfully dark, isn't it?"

"My life hasn't exactly been sunshine and flowers, Will..." She reminded him softly.

"Of course...sorry."

"It's all right." She said, softly.

"Um...this movie isn't exactly..."

"Lighthearted?" She asked, looking over at him.

He shook his head. "But there is a bright spot – the scientist in it...it's Tesla."

She looked up in surprise. "What?"

"Most movies use Thomas Edison when they have to use an inventor, but this one – this uses Nikola Tesla."

She tensed. "What's the plot of the film again?"

"Two magicians in a war to come out on top. One of them gets a device from Tesla to help him perform his trick..."

Helen tensed.

"_Come, Helen, you'll enjoy it." John assured._

"_I've never been one for illusion, John. You know that." She said as she looked out of the carriage at the theater._

"_There's an act, Helen. An act which I'm sure you'll enjoy thoroughly." He insisted._

_The marquis proclaimed the Great Danton as the performer of the evening, and she sighed. "Very well. If it means so much to you..."_

"One of them died..."

Will looked at her, surprised. "I thought you hadn't seen the movie."

"I haven't." She said, looking up at him as she bit the insides of her cheek.

"Then how..."

"There were two magicians in London – The Great Danton and The Professor."

Will looked at her in disbelief. "Tell me again that you haven't seen this movie..."

"The Great Danton had a trick which was...phenomenal. It fascinated John. Mostly because...he thought he'd found another like him who could teleport at will. Though in my opinion, I believed he'd found a double."

Will's jaw dropped. "So...Tesla's machine..."

"What did it do?" She demanded, seriously.

"According to the movie, it made clones."

Helen inhaled sharply. "I want to speak to Nikola right this moment."

"We don't know where he is..." Will said, knowing how displeased she would be with the pronouncement.

"Then find him." She said, seriously. "I'll be damned if I let him make a vampire army."

"Look, if the story's true, then he's had it for over a hundred years. Why wait to use it?" He asked, recognizing that the story didn't ring true.

"In 1899, Nikola approached me. He'd been forced to leave Colorado Springs for his rather bold experiments, and he wanted the persecution to stop."

"So..."

"So I falsified reports of his death, and he went underground."

"Still...what's the deal?"

"About this time, I first heard the reports that the Borden, or the Professor, had been imprisoned for the murder of Algier, or the Great Danton." She said, swallowing. "Several months earlier, James had informed me that Algier had sought Nikola's services, and begged me to keep an eye on Algier, lest something happen to him because of Nikola's vampiric nature."

She looked up at him with a sigh. "Even if the device was entirely fictional, it is an idea which would have occurred to Nikola, and to Nikola alone. And with his vision to bring _sanguine vampirus_ back to the Earth, I have a hard time believing that Nikola hasn't begun work on such a device..."

Will sighed. "Great. I bring you a movie, and I get a mission instead..."

"Par for the course, Will." She said with a sickened expression on her face. "It's just par for the course."


	13. Summoned

_'...It would degrade me to marry Heathcliff now; so he shall never know how I love him: and that, not because he's handsome, Nelly, but because he's more myself than I am. Whatever our souls are made of, his and mine are the same; and Linton's is as different as a moonbeam from lightning, or frost from fire.'_

Helen sighed softly as she set the book down. She could relate to Catherine far too well, she realized sadly. "He's more myself than I am..." She whispered. That had been John for her, she thought to herself. The darker parts of her personality had been embedded in her memory of him, she realized. She'd blamed him, not just for his wrongs, but also for her own. "Forgive me," she whispered, looking heavenward.

Suddenly, her door slammed open, and she looked up as her heart pounded in fear. She clutched the sheets around her, nervously. How could she protect the lives which counted on her for their birth?

"Have I made it clear that I don't like being summoned?" Nikola demanded as he walked into the room.

Helen tensed as she released her grip on the sheets. "Hello, Nikola."

"Your lackey told me you thought I had a cloning machine." He said, clearly agitated. "I came to tell you that I am not working – nor have I ever worked – on a cloning machine."

She tensed as she bit the insides of her cheeks as she looked up at him. "I don't believe you." She finally said, looking at him seriously.

"That's your choice." He said evenly. "But it's the truth."

"Angier. What did he want?" She demanded.

"John's power, ironically enough." He said, seriously. "The ability to move from place to another with the blink of an eye."

"How do you explain this?" Helen asked, showing him the movie.

"It's a film, and while I was flattered to discover I played a rather pivotal role in it, it's just that." He said, seriously. "May I leave now?"

"After I've made one thing clear." She said, seriously.

"I know, I know...if there's suddenly an army of vampires, you'll come and hunt me down." He said, clearly bored with her words. "We've been down this road before."

"What actually happened in 1899?" She inquired with all the intensity of her being.

"You mean, while you were a little preoccupied trying to find and cure John Druitt?" Tesla asked, pointedly.

She threw him a look.

"I was working on nuclear physics." He said, seriously. "The town of Colorado Springs didn't appreciate it when some of their citizens began getting ill."

"Nuclear physics?" She asked, raising an eyebrow.

He nodded.

"Then your request for my help had nothing to do with Algier and Borden..."

"They did that on their own."

She sighed.

"Now...may I return to my experiments?"

"Keep in touch." She requested. "If I don't receive periodic updates, I may become nervous and send a team to find you."

Nikola rolled his eyes. "I didn't reemerge after all this time just to have you dictate my every move, Helen."

"No, you didn't." She said, evenly. "You returned to ask me for my help in resurrection of the vampire species, and when I refused, you tried to kill me."

"Yes, and Druitt came to save you." He patronized. "I wonder what would happen now if I were to ask the same."

She tensed.

"You keep thinking that you're in a position of power, Helen," he said, wryly. "But the truth is that right now, you're more vulnerable than ever."

He let his vampiric traits surface, and she scooted further back in her bed fearfully.

"We may not feed on humans the way the authors of our time believed, but those two fetuses would make a great snack."

Helen wrapped her arms around her belly protectively. "Nikola, please..."

He walked toward her, and suddenly, a blast from the weapon Nikola had created to kill the super-charged abnormal several months before knocked the vampire out cold.

"Thank you, Will." Helen said as she recognized the weapon wielder.

"That was close."

She inhaled. "Yes. But at least, now we know that he has a susceptibility."

"What did he mean about not feeding on humans the way the books say?"

She tensed. "Have you ever wondered why the birth rate is so much higher today than it was in the past?"

"Modern medicine. It's getting better."

She swallowed as she shook her head. "Vampires didn't feed on adult humans. They fed on infants and small children. It was the source of their power."

"We're going to keep a better eye on you, Magnus." Will said, seriously. "And maybe we should lock him in the shoo."

"He'd only get out." She said, seriously.

"Then, we'll drop him in the Arctic."

She bit her lip before she nodded. "Perhaps that would be wise..."

"Consider it done."


	14. Nesting

_Two weeks later:_

"What's going on?" Will asked as he saw yet another crate carried into Magnus's room.

"I don't know." Henry admitted. "But the Doc asked that these packages get sent directly to her."

"How many packages have come through?"

"A lot."

"Any idea what's in them?"

He shook his head. "She's being very secretive."

"Okay." He said, nodding. "Thanks, Henry."

"No problem. You gonna try to get her to tell you what she's bought?"

"Yeah." He said with a small chuckle of amusement. "But it's probably not going to be easy."

Henry laughed appreciatively as he looked back at his tablet and began walking down the corridor.

"Hey! Watch it!" One of the couriers yelled as they swerved out of his way.

"Sorry!" The absent-minded engineer/IT tech/werewolf said, waving a hand behind him in apology.

Will shook his head with a silent chortle as he walked into Helen's room. She was kneeling on her bed, legs crossed behind her as she stabilized herself with one hand on one of the posts to try and stabilize herself as she rubbed her stomach with the other.

"No, no. Over there." She ordered, moving her hand from her belly as she pointed to a corner of the room.

"Magnus?"

She looked over with a smile. "Will!"

"What are you doing?" He asked, puzzled.

"Nesting. Isn't it lovely?" She asked with a grin.

"Nesting?" He asked, raising an eyebrow.

"It is a clinical term." She said with a wry grin.

"I know, but..." He looked around the room to find nothing but wires and tubles, plastic and metal. "What is this stuff?"

"The equivalent of a neonatal ward."

His eyes widened. "And you call this nesting?"

"It's amazing what you can find online." She teased.

"What are you going to do with this stuff after the babies are born?"

"What I did with all of Ashley's baby things." She said, seriously. "Donate them to a deserving charity."

"Well, there are definitely some out there that could use this stuff..."

"And think of the tax write-off." She quipped.

He laughed at her wit before he sobered. "Seriously, most people don't buy a neonatal wing and set it up in their quarters."

She sighed. "Most people have the luxury of going to hospital when they go into labor."

"Wait...you're not..."

She shook her head. "One of the downsides to my unique physiology is that I require a great deal of discretion and a specific team of highly specialized physicians. And to be honest, the doctor who delivers a woman's child is rarely the one whom she's been seeing for the last several months."

"So, your version of nesting is preparing for the worst..." He observed.

"Do you blame me?" She asked, soberly.

"No." He said, shaking his head. "It actually makes a lot of sense, but..."

"But?'

"This wasn't what I was expecting when I read about nesting."

She threw a curious look to him as he blushed. "Okay, okay, I read some books.."

She tried to hide the smile playing on her lips.

"Look, you've done this before!" He defended. "I haven't!"

Helen chuckled softly.

"And you're making fun of me."

She smirked in amusement. "If it makes you feel better, I did purchase some of the more...traditional...items manufactured for newborns."

"Strangely enough, it doesn't." He said, shaking his head.

"Have a seat. They'll be through in a few minutes." Helen said, shaking her head with a giggle as she returned to her work. "No, no...I need the ventilator over there by the heart monitor."


	15. Fear

"_Tesla may have shocked you into your senses, John, but nobody becomes what you were without a predilection for killing." She declared as she looked away from him. "I have no doubt that you'll return to your murderous habits one day."_

"_I wasn't asking you out on a date, hm, if that's what you're thinking." He sighed. "Perhaps I just...oh, wanted to know where we stood."_

_She looked at him with distrustful eyes as her mind was cast over the last several months. Just when in the last year had she allowed herself to align herself with him again?_

_She felt a strong kick in her stomach, and she looked down somewhat confused as she found her body rounded in the curve of pregnancy. The twins, she remembered._

_The rooftop in Egypt changed to the library in the Sanctuary and a young woman in her twenties who looked remarkably like Ashley stepped forward, excitedly. "Mom! Mom! Mom!"_

"_Yes, Lindsay?"_

"_I have a surprise for you." She said with a grin._

"_A surprise?" Helen asked, confused._

"_Yep." She said with a grin as John stepped out of the shadows. "Hello, Helen."_

_Helen tensed, wishing that she had a gun. "John."_

"_Another child?" He asked, raising an eyebrow in surprise. "When did you and I reunite?"_

_The look in his eye. He was the Ripper. "Lindsay, come over here." She demanded._

"_I thought you'd be happy." Lindsay said, confused._

"_Come over here!" Helen commanded._

"_What's wrong, Mom?"_

Helen's eyes snapped open as she placed a hand on her stomach. Having children who could teleport through time and space would be awful. Especially if they felt a need to connect with their father. She looked over at the radio on her nightstand. She reached over for it. "Henry?"

"Yes, Doc?"

"Is the EM shield working?"

"Uh...yeah, Doc. It is. Why? Something wrong?"

"No." She said, trying to calm her heart beat. "Everything's fine."

"You sound weird."

"Nightmare." She said, softly, as tears welled up in her eyes.

"You want me to come up? We can talk about it..."

She bit her lip as she looked heavenward, trying to blink away the tears. "No, Henry, I'm fine." She whispered with a small sob in her throat.

"I'll send the Big Guy up."

"That's not necessary."

"Magnus, it's four o' clock in the morning, and you sound like you're about to cry. I'll send the Big Guy up."

"Thank you, Henry." She whispered, vulnerably.

A few moments later, there was a knock on the door, and the Big Guy entered. "Helen," he greeted as he saw the tears slipping down her cheeks.

She tried to wipe the tears from her cheeks, and he walked over to wipe her cheeks with his calloused fingers. With only a moment of hesitation, he reached over and gave her the hug he knew she needed.


	16. Reprieve

_Three weeks later:_

A gentle knock at the door alerted Helen to her visitors, and she looked up from where she sat, reading _A Tale of Two Cities_. "Come in," she invited.

Dr. Luke Patterson walked in. "How's our patient today?"

"I'm fine." She assured with a small smile as she set the book down.

"Glad to hear it." He said with a grin.

"More than a little tired of staying in bed all day," she teased. "But I'm fine."

"Well, let's see how you're doing today," Luke began with a chuckle. "Before we renegotiate."

She smiled appreciatively as he took her blood pressure. "Still a little higher than I'd like, but better than it was ten weeks ago," he admitted.

"I've been doing my best." She beamed.

He ran a few more tests to verify that both she and the twins were healthy before he looked up. "Well, Helen, I think we've passed the worst of it. If you could keep the twins in there for a few more weeks, I think that would be best, but if they have minds of their own – which with you for a mother is a given – I'd be okay if they came any day now."

Helen gave him a pointed look at the "minds of their own" comment before she smiled appreciatively. "Does that mean I can get out of this blasted bed for longer than a few minutes a day?"

He mockingly hesitated for a few moments before he nodded. "Yes, Helen, you can get out of bed for a few hours a day. Stay pretty close to it, and don't overdo it, but the occasional walk would probably make you feel good, even visiting with a few of your less-dangerous abnormals would probably be recommended for morale."

"Glad to hear it." Helen sighed in relief.

"You've been dying for me to say those words, haven't you?" He teased as he put away his stethoscope and other tools.

"You have no idea." She groaned. "My staff have been bringing films in for me to watch for the last ten weeks. We started with Titanic, and most recently, Henry suggested that I watch a television show about a team that travels through a ring that was supposedly discovered in Giza, and travels to different worlds via a stable wormhole. And he thought I would enjoy it because the actress who plays Colonel-Doctor Samantha Carter, the female scientist, looks a great deal like me."

Luke laughed. "Sounds like Henry."

She smiled in soft amusement before she sobered. "Thank you, Luke, for watching over me and my children so carefully."

"My pleasure, Helen." He assured. "Shall I help you out of bed?"

"If you would be so kind." She said, nodding.

He chuckled as he offered her his hand to help stabilize her as she stood.

"Much, much better." She sighed, contentedly.

"I'll go warn Will." He teased as he walked toward the door.

Helen smiled as she watched him go before she looked at herself in the mirror. It was time for a good shower, and then, she would dress. After that, she would check in on the Sanctuary.

-

Dressed in a maternity-style pencil skirt and a matching blouse, Helen Magnus walked down the corridors of her beloved home and Sanctuary.

"When did he arrive?" She heard Will's voice from around the corner.

"Sometime last night." Henry replied.

"Where is he?"

"In the shoo. I figured that's the best place for him until we figure out what's going on."

"Have you told Magnus?"

Helen stopped in her tracks.

"Hell no." Henry said, emphatically.

She placed a hand on her belly, wondering what they were trying to hide from her.

"That's probably for the best. We should figure out what's going on before we tell her. We don't want to complicate things for her and the babies."

"Yeah..."

Helen had never had to hide before, and she refused to believe that she needed to continue to hide now. She stepped around the corner. "Will. Henry." She greeted with a small smile.

"Magnus!" Will said, jumping in surprise. "What are you doing out of bed?"

"Luke offered me a reprieve for good behavior over the last several weeks." She said, raising an eyebrow at his reaction. "I thought he had told you."

"Nope. He didn't tell me..."

"Ah." She said with a shrug. "Now, what's new?"

"Nothing." Henry protested, shaking his head emphatically. "Absolutely nothing is new."

"I've been in bed for nine weeks, and nothing is new?" She asked, skeptically. "Perhaps I should make my rounds and ask questions as I see things I need explained..."

"No!" The men cried in tandem.

"What is going on here?" She asked, seriously. "I know that you're hiding something from me, and I am not keen on secrets within my sanctuary."

"We just got a new patient last night." Will said, seriously. "And he's really dangerous, so I think you should just let us handle him."

"You could have said that from the beginning." She said, watching them. "Why were you trying to hide him from me?"

"Because..." Henry said, trying to think of a logical reason.

"Because it's John Druitt." Will finally admitted.

Helen's blood ran cold. "What?"

"He's more like the Druitt who died than the Druitt who took Ashley to the shoo...so, I think we have "shocked" Druitt, and not the Ripper."

Helen tensed. "I want to see him."

"I don't think that's a good idea, Magnus."

"I want to see him." She commanded, turning a fierce look to him.

"Okay." He said with a sigh. "But just to warn you, we don't know what his story is yet. When he came to the front door, the big guy knocked him out and took him to the shoo. He hasn't talked to us since."

She raised an eyebrow. "Then I will speak with him and retrieve the story."

"Yes, ma'am." Henry said, somewhat cheekily as Will led the pregnant doctor down to the shoo.

-

She walked up to the glass, refusing to let her heart endear itself to the man who could very well mean her small family and Sanctuary harm.

Dressed in his usual calf-length leather jacket, the bald man was standing in one of the corners opposite from where she stood facing the wall with his hands clasped behind his back.

"Who are you?" She demanded over the intercom.

He turned at the sound of her voice. "Helen." He greeted, gratefully.

"Who are you?" She demanded again.

"It's me, Helen. John." He said, seriously. He caught a glimpse of her belly, and his brow furrowed in confusion. "What's going on here?"

"Funny," Helen said, angling her head slightly. "I was about to ask you the same thing."

"I woke up in Tesla's laboratory, and came straight here."

Helen tensed. "Tesla's laboratory?"

"I was chained to a hospital bed. Luckily for me, lock-picking has been a hobby of mine since childhood." He said, seriously. "Now, since I have cooperated with you, it's your turn to cooperate with me..."

Helen inhaled deeply. "You can't be John Druitt. He was killed seven months ago in an attempt to retrieve an abnormal."

"Which is why we took such extreme measures when we saw you," Will added. "What's the last thing you remember?"

"Ashley's death..." Druitt whispered, slowly enunciating each syllable as if it was physically painful for him to be reminded of the fact. "Nikola and I had made plans to bring the Cabal to its knees. He brought me to his laboratory, and I stepped into a room. The next thing I knew, I awoke, chained to the hospital bed." He stepped right up next to the glass to look Helen in the eyes. "I don't know who died seven months ago, but I swear it wasn't me."

Helen looked at Will with a sick look on her face.


	17. Cloned

"I want Tesla back here immediately." Helen ordered as she resumed her rightful place in her study behind the desk.

"Magnus, calm down." Will said, soothingly.

"Calm down?" She demanded, incredulously. "How on Earth do you think I'm going to manage that?"

"Look," he began. "You probably have more of the pieces of the puzzle than you think you do. I mean, we just dropped him in the Arctic a few weeks ago."

"Because I suspected him of researching cloning." She said with sudden understanding.

"What if he already had a cloning device active?" Will said, following her train of thought.

"What if he'd already used it?" She asked, tensing. "I want a sample from John's remains for analysis against this John."

"Okay." He said, nodding. "What good is that going to do us?"

"As with all of my patients, I have a sample of the original John's DNA on file. We can compare both samples and determine whether we're dealing with a clone situation or not."

"And we can find out if we've got a viable clone..." Will began.

"Or a failed experiment." Helen said, swallowing down emotion.

"I can handle this, Magnus." He said after studying her for a moment.

"You'll need my help to analyze the tissue samples." She said, shaking her head.

"It's virtually all done by computers now, Henry and I can handle it."

"I need to do this, Will." She whispered. "If for no other reason than my peace of mind."

Will nodded soberly before he turned to leave. He paused for a moment, and looked back at her. "You know, Magnus, those test results aren't going to change the fact that the father of those babies died."

"Perhaps not," she whispered after a moment. "But it might mean that Ashley's father is still here."

-

With deft fingers, Helen input the code that allowed her entrance into John's isolation chamber. She pushed a small cart into the room, and he looked over. "Helen," he greeted, warmly.

"I need a sample of your blood." She announced, forcing herself into her professional capacity.

"Of course." He said, sitting on the bed as he took off his leather jacket and rolled up his sleeve.

She quickly tied a rubber band around his arm and gently tapped his arm so that she could see the veins more easily.

"You look well, Helen." He said, leaning in to catch her eyes.

She didn't react, focusing on the task at hand.

"Another child?" He prodded gently. "Who's the father?"

"It's none of your concern." She murmured as she stuck the needle into his vein.

He sighed. "I'm just making conversation," he said, looking away after a moment. "Something which you seem to be unwilling or unable to do."

She sighed as she finished collecting the sample and pulled the vial from his arm. "Twins. I'm expecting twins," said as she placed a cotton ball on the puncture wound.

"Congratulations." He said, softly.

She swallowed. "Thank you," she managed.

"Their father must be quite proud."

She paused as spoke. "He...I wasn't able to tell him before he...left..."

"I'm sorry to hear that," he whispered, sincerely.

She swallowed as she looked over at him. She inhaled as she set the sample aside. "We believe that Nikola may have been experimenting with cloning."

He raised an eyebrow. "What?"

"He assured me that it was not true, but..."

"Nikola cannot be trusted." He finished.

"Precisely."

"And you believe he may have cloned me in preparation for his vampiric army..."

She nodded. "It would fit his usual methods of operation."

"And the samples...they are so that you can compare mine and the other Druitt's against the DNA you have on file."

She nodded. "Yes."

Silence reigned for a moment, and he looked back at her.

"You were upset when you mentioned the other Druitt's death," he prodded gently. "Was he the father of your children?"

She closed her eyes with the pain of her loss, and he reached a hand out to touch her cheek. She pulled away, knowing that getting close to this Druitt could be hazardous. "I will return after I receive the results." She said, standing.

He sighed. That was Helen – forever professional.

-

Helen sat in her lab, looking through the microscope at the various samples.

"Magnus?"

"Yes, Will?" She asked, refusing to be deterred from her work.

"How's it looking so far?"

"Like you should leave me be so that I can finish what I started." She said, pointedly as she looked up at him.

"That good, huh?"

"Will..."

"Look, Magnus, you're about to give birth to twins. You can't obsess over this like you would if you were...normal..."

She looked up from the microscope sharply. "Normal?" She asked, looking at him seriously. "I recall a time once where you wished that at least I would be normal."

"And I got used to it." He said, seriously. "But you need your rest. Even if you are...you..."

"I need to finish these analyses."

"You need to keep your health as your top priority." He challenged.

She paused in her work before she looked over at him. "You didn't see the look in his eyes when I suggested that he might be a clone. Some duplicate shell of the man he thought he was."

"And it probably wouldn't have affected me the way it affected you." He pointed out.

She turned a critical eye to him. "You think I'm too personally involved in this to be objective."

"You've loved him for over a hundred years, Magnus." He said, seriously. "I'd be worried if you were objective."

She inhaled sharply as the pain of John's loss washed over her again.

"With Druitt's history, you can't ask for a better ending than the one you got."

She watched him closely.

"In the end, he died trying to save you. Not trying to kill you, and now, you have two new reminders of everything you both shared."

She looked down at her stomach with a small sigh as she listened to the rest of his words. Soft tears slipped down her cheeks as she listened.

"This Druitt...could become a threat as easily as you thought the other Druitt could. All it takes is some...trigger...and he could go back to being the Ripper."

She swallowed as she looked up at him. Tears were welled up in her eyes, and it broke his heart to see her suffering. "John killed all of the Cabal leaders already. If this John has been as readily cured as the other, I doubt there could be another trigger as serious as that."

"You don't know that, Magnus." He said, shaking his head. "It could be something as simple as seeing a working girl in an unsavory part of town."

She tensed as she returned to her work. "Please, Will...I know you're trying to help, but I could really use the peace and quiet to work."

He sighed. "Magnus..."

She turned tear-stained cheeks to him as she bit her lip. "Please, Will," she begged.

He bit his lip as he nodded. "I'll be back in an hour."

She nodded as she returned to the empty solace of her work.


	18. Original

The hour passed slowly as Helen meticulously studied the results from the battery of tests that she'd run.

"Magnus?" Will asked, walking in to find her standing and facing the counter away from the microscope and the computers.

"He was a clone," she whispered. "The father of my children was a clone."

Will inhaled, studying her. "I'm sorry to hear that."

She turned, and he could see the redness and puffiness of her eyes, indicating a recent cry. "And he would have died. Even without the abnormal's help."

Will's brow furrowed. "Huh?"

"Nikola had poisoned him." She said, simply. "With specifically placed capsules that would release a toxin into his body. The fatal injuries which he had sustained were in one such place. One of the reasons he was unable to hold on until you arrived.

"Damn, that's cold."

She nodded, slowly. "In all likelihood, both Johns made a play for an escape. In the confusion, Nikola most likely forgot which was the Original, and kept this John in his lab while he awaited his fate."

"So, the guy we have in the shoo..."

"Is the original John Druitt." She said with a sigh. "And he's been poisoned too."

"Oh boy."

"It's all right," she assured, numbly. "I've already prescribed a treatment, and sent it with my manservant."

"So, wait...how is it that neither of the Druitts told us about this cloning thing?"

"Most likely, they suffered the effects of a chemical amnesia brought on by the same poison which was designed to take their lives. Knowing Nikola, he could have arranged for one that could target such a precise memory." She said, swallowing slowly. "Undoubtedly, as the effects of the poison wear off, John will begin to remember the event in greater detail."

"I'll be ready," he said, nodding.

She bit her lip as she nodded. "That would be wise..."

"Magnus?" He asked, noticing that she was somewhat hesitant to agree or disagree with his suggestion.

"I'll be fine, Will." She said, managing a faint smile in order to convince him.

"Maybe you should visit with him first...tell him what's going on." He said, voicing her unspoken desire. "He'd rather hear it from you anyway."

She nodded slowly. "Yes, I know."

"Take your time," he said, seriously.

She nodded as she inhaled, resting a hand on her stomach.

"You okay?"

"Tired," she admitted.

"Go rest."

"After I see John." She said, looking over at her protege.

"I'll hold you to that."

She managed an amused smile as she walked out of the lab.

-

"John," she greeted as she walked slowly into his isolation room.

He looked over, noticing instantly how tired and weary she looked. "Sit, love," he offered, allowing the term of endearment to slip out as helped her over to the hospital bed.

"Thank you," she said, almost, but not quite, surprised at his kindness and tenderness. Had this John returned as well? Was it too much to hope that he had?

"You're welcome." He said, sitting beside her.

She wrapped her arms around her belly and closed her eyes as she rested for a moment.

"Are you all right?" He asked, studying her.

She nodded as she inhaled and looked back up at him. "Yes. I have been on bedrest for the last several weeks, and this is my first day on the job again."

"You should rest," he said, looking over at her.

"I will." She assured. "But I need to speak with you."

"All right?"

"We've verified it as well as we could." She said, softly. "Nikola cloned you. You are the original."

The look on his face turned from one of surprise to one of hostility and anger.

"John," she whispered, touching his chest as she tried to stem his overwhelming rage.

"Haven't I lost enough?" He asked, pain lining his face. "First, Ashley, and then nearly a year of my life."

She tensed.

"It may not be the most virtuous of lives, but it is my life." He said, pensively.

"I know." She agreed as tears welled up in her eyes. "And I hate that Nikola stole it from us."

Her choice of words caused him to look into her eyes in confusion. "Us?"

She looked down at her belly. "After Ashley's memorial service...you...your clone...and I..."

"I see." He said when he realized that she would be unable to finish the statement.

"I was confused," she whispered, looking up. "I was lonely and confused."

"You didn't love him?"

"I never said that," she mumbled as she looked back down at her stomach.

"Helen," he breathed, putting a finger under her chin and forcing her to look up at him.

"I missed you," she managed as the tears began to slip down her cheeks.

In a rare display of affection, he wrapped his arms around her, allowing her to cry her tears on his shoulder for a few moments before he pulled away. "I want to help you, Helen. I want to raise these children as I should have been here to help you raise Ashley."

She inhaled sharply as she looked over at him. "Don't toy with me, John," she whispered, vulnerably.

He looked down at her belly, and reached out to touch it. He stopped short, and she looked up into his eyes before she reached out for his hand and pulled it toward her stomach. With a tender caress, she touched his hand to her belly and looked up at him. With her other hand, she touched his cheek. "I love you."

He looked up from her belly, and up into her eyes. "I love you too, Helen." He murmured as he leaned in and kissed her tenderly.


	19. Mission

Helen led John into her study, where Henry, Will, the "Big Guy", and Kate were all waiting for them. "We've received reports that Nikola has been experimenting with cloning." She announced as she began the impromptu staff meeting. She looked over at John as she arrived behind her desk. "And we now have those reports confirmed."

Henry and Kate looked over at Druitt, eying him somewhat warily.

"John, you know the location of the lab?"

He nodded, succinctly.

"Take Will, Henry and Kate with you." She ordered. "I want that device destroyed before he has a chance or a desire to use it any further than he already has."

He nodded, in acquiescence, as she turned her attention to the werewolf. "Henry, I want all of his notes on this project. I want to know who his test subjects were and how many tests he's been able to run."

Henry nodded. "Sure thing, Doc."

Helen turned to Will next. "I want you and Kate to keep an eye out for anything suspicious. If it seems that Nikola has set up any sort of trap, I want you to tell John.

She looked over at John. "At any sign of danger, I want you all out of there."

John nodded.

"We cannot allow Nikola to replicate himself." Helen said, soberly. "Especially if he continues to research how to reverse his vampiric sterility.

"His what?" Will asked, confused.

"Tesla has been unable to infect another human being with his own vampiric traits." John explained.

"But when he and I first met in Rome a year ago, he revealed that he had been experimenting with how to create other vampires." Helen continued. "However, all he managed to do was to make sterile vampiric drones."

"Which is why he needed her in the first place," John said with knowing sobriety.

Kate turned a strange look to her, and she sighed. "He wanted my help."

"That was during that whole...weird snake thing, wasn't it?" Will asked with his brow furrowed.

Helen nodded. "John kidnapped Ashley, and they saved me together."

"And I thought my family was messed up." Kate said, shaking her head.

Helen turned an amused half-smile to the bounty hunter before she looked back at John, more soberly. "Time is of the essence."

He nodded slowly before he looked at the others. "I will meet you outside the gates," he said, seriously.

"Come on," Will said, motioning to the door as he realized that the couple needed some time alone.

They all filed out soberly as Helen looked at John. "You don't want to go." She said, knowing the look on his face.

"I'm loathe to leave you alone so near the time of your confinement," he admitted.

"I won't be alone." She said, seriously. "I still have my manservant."

"Oh, yes, the hirsute one."

"One of my oldest and dearest friends."

He sighed, still somewhat hesitant.

"Take this." She said, offering him a cell phone. "We will keep you informed if anything should happen."

He nodded. "I will leave, then."

"I will await your return." She said with a half-smile as he turned to leave.

He turned back to her and gently kissed her lips. "I will return with the task completed," he promised.

"I will hold you to that," she said, soberly.

"Get some rest, Helen." He suggested, squeezing her hand gently as he turned to leave.

She nodded as she watched him go.


	20. Battle

"What exactly does she want us to do?" Will asked as he looked around the lab for a second time.

"Find the notes and blow up the lab." Kate said with a wicked grin. "Nothing hard about that."

"I hardly think that is an appropriate interpretation of what Helen said." John said, wryly. "She merely asked us to identify and destroy the device while Henry locates and retrieves Tesla's notes on the project."

"And let this guy keep up his other mad science experiments?" Kate asked, skeptically. "I don't think so."

"I don't think she really cares about what happens to everything else. But those notes are critical." Will said, seriously.

"I agree," John said, nodding.

"What a shock," Tesla said, emerging from the shadows. "Jack the Ripper went back to being his lover's lackey."

"Ah," John said, turning to face his foe. "The witticisms of Nikola Tesla. As usual, they are rather tasteless and crudely fashioned."

"Ooh, I'm so scared!" He said, sarcastically.

"How can you be here?" Will asked, looking over at the scientist. "We dropped you in the Arctic..."

"Oh, is that where he ended up?" Nikola asked, only mildly surprised.

"He?" Henry asked, swallowing.

Several beings, looking like copies of Nikola Tesla, emerged from the shadows behind him as he allowed his vampiric traits to reemerge. "You might remind Helen," he said with a wicked grin. "That for me, twelve months is time enough to raise the army which she had feared for so long."

With deft fingers, John retrieved his blade, preparing to use it if necessary against his age-old nemesis.

"Henry! Grab the hard drive and go!" Will cried, pointing to the computer as Kate pulled out the weapon that Tesla himself had designed.

The werewolf instantly sprang into action as Kate fired the weapon.

One of the Teslas went down as John blocked several blows from two of the vampires. Will reached for his pistol and shot at the vampires.

They paused, obviously annoyed by the feeble attempt at an offensive attack by the psychologist. They roared before they continued forward. Two shots from the energy weapon forced the vampires to the floor.

Will turned a grateful look to Kate who put the weapon down and grabbed his arm. She pulled him to the device that stood in the center of the room with space enough inside for a man to stand – even one as tall as John Druitt. She ripped open a package of C4 and attached the explosive to the device. The timer was set at one minute and thirty seconds.

They looked over to find Druitt, only to find both Druitt and Henry gone.

The vampires from the first wave of attack were starting to wake as Kate pulled the weapon back up to her chest. Will inhaled, nervously, as he felt the familiar puff of air that accompanied John Druitt's teleportation. Druitt grasped the collar of his jacket in his fist before they traveled through time and space to appear just outside the Sanctuary.

"That...was close..." Kate breathed.

"Indeed it was," John admitted, catching his breath as they rang the bell to announce their arrival.

The door was instantly opened, and each of the team members walked into the foyer.

"Druitt," the Sasquatch called as he hurried to where they stood.

"Yes, my hirsute friend?" John asked, turning.

"It's Helen," he said, pointing down the corridor.

Will exchanged worried looks with Henry and Kate as John raced down the corridor.


	21. Birth

"Where is she?" John demanded of the Sasquatch.

"In the study." He said, opening the door.

Helen lay on the floor, unconscious.

"What happened?" John asked as he touched her neck to verify that she was still alive.

"Seizure." He grunted. "I called the doctor."

"Where is he?" John demanded, looking up again.

"New City Hospital. He said he'd come as soon as he could."

John's face hardened as he stood. "I will return shortly," he announced as he passed by Will, Kate, and Henry.

The "Big Guy" looked over. "Henry, get the stretcher."

Henry nodded as he left the room, quickly.

"What can we do to help?" Will asked, looking over.

Just then, Helen began convulsing again, and Will tensed.

"Come on, Will," Kate said, touching his shoulder as she pulled him gently toward the door. "There's nothing you can do right now."

It was only a few minutes before John appeared in the doorway with Luke in hand. The startled doctor walked into the study to find Helen's unconscious body on a stretcher. "My team is coming," he said, looking over at Druitt. "And they don't need any help."

He inhaled before he began a quick examination of Helen's limp body. "Preeclamptic seizures," he said with a sigh. "We need to do a Cesarean section."

He looked over at the Big Guy. "Can you assist?"

The Sasquatch nodded with a couple of grunts.

Luke quickly administered a seizure inhibitor to his patient before he turned to Druitt and the rest of the team. "When my staff come, send them to the OR, we'll begin prepping her for delivery."

"We'll bring them down." Will said as the Big Guy transported the stretcher to the elevator.

-

Nearly fifteen minutes later, John stood outside the operating room, nervously. "How long are they going to take?" He asked, inhaling.

"They're still prepping her for surgery," Will said, seriously. "I'm sure they'll let you know when they're ready to do the actual delivery."

They heard a familiar woman's voice, and John walked to the door. "Helen?"

"John!"

A nurse walked out of the room. "Is there a John out here?"

Druitt stepped forward. "I'm John."

"Come with me," she said, walking toward another room. "She would like you in the delivery room, so we'll get you scrubbed up."

He nodded, following her. Only a few moments passed before he returned, dressed in scrubs.

"Tell her we're rooting for her," Will said, looking over at Druitt.

He nodded as he walked into the operating room.

"John," Helen whispered, worriedly.

"I'm here, Helen," he assured as he took her hand in his own.

"They told me that I had two seizures," she fretted. "Do you know what that could do to the babies?"

"Sh," John whispered, leaning in close to her face as she lay on the operating table. "Everything will be fine."

"You don't know that," she whispered, fearfully. "Ashley assured me that the mission would turn out well..."

He gently kissed her forehead. "I'm here, Helen," he whispered, tenderly.

"Helen?" Luke asked, looking over at her.

She looked up at the doctor. "Yes?"

"You're going to be fine. Just a few minutes, and you'll be a mother again."

She sighed as she looked up at the ceiling, biting her lip nervously.

"Do you remember Oxford?" John asked, studying her face.

She looked over at him, confused. "Of course."

"Do you remember our midnight strolls in the Botanical Gardens?"

She managed a tender smile. "Yes, John, I do."

"As lovely as you looked in the moonlight then," he whispered as he tenderly brushed a stray tendril from her face. "You've never looked more lovely to me than you do right now."

She managed a tearfully wry smile. "You're incorrigible."

"Perhaps," he whispered, planting a tender kiss on her cheek. "But I've never been as in love with you as I am at this moment."

"John," she whispered. "I'm afraid."

"I know, Helen." He said, squeezing her hand, gently.

"Okay, Helen, here comes baby number 1." Luke announced.

John and Helen both looked up as one of the twins was pulled from her womb. "It's a boy," Luke announced.

"Is he breathing?" Helen asked, paling as she waited for her son's first breath.

The moment that passed was one of the most torturous of both John and Helen's lives before the newborn gasped for breath and let out a wail.

Helen sighed in relief as tears slipped down her cheeks.

"It's a boy, Helen," John cried, almost in shock.

Helen turned a tearful grin to her lover as she nodded.

"And...baby number 2..." Luke murmured as he pulled the second child from her womb. There was no waiting for this child's wail, and Helen felt as though her heart would burst in gratitude.

"It's a girl." Luke said, looking over at the waiting parents.

Helen closed her eyes as grateful tears slipped down her cheeks.

"A girl," John whispered as he leaned over and kissed her lips. "Two beautiful children, Helen."

She opened her eyes to look at him as she inhaled deeply. "Yes, John, we have very beautiful children."

He offered her a grin like she hadn't seen since their days at Oxford. "Helen Magnus, I love you with my whole heart."

She swallowed as she studied his face. "I love you too, John," she finally whispered, emotionally.


	22. Twins

It was nearly two hours later before John finally emerged from the operating room, looking emotionally drained though thoroughly happy.

"What happened?" Will asked, instantly.

"The twins are fine." He reported with a faint smile, full of the pride of a new father. A daughter, Audrey Grace, and a son, Gregory Ayer."

"And the Doc?" Henry asked, worriedly.

"Is recovering from her cesarean section." He said, seriously. "She'll be fine."

"That's good. Great." Will said with a sigh of relief. "When can we see her?"

"Give her time to rest, Will," Druitt suggested, gently.

"Right." He said, somewhat sheepishly.

Druitt managed a small smile.

"You look tired," Kate observed.

He nodded. "I am somewhat weary," he admitted. "Perhaps I will rest like Helen and the children."

"Good idea." Henry said, nodding. "We'll take care of the Doc."

He looked over at the team. "Of that, I am sure."


	23. Sabbatical

_One week later:_

"As far as I can tell, that's going to be great, Henry." Will said, looking at the sketches of Will's latest invention.

"Thanks, Will."

"You seem to be carrying on well without me," Helen said as she walked into the study.

"Magnus!" Will cried, turning around.

Helen smiled.

"How are you feeling, Doc?"

"Very well, thank you." She said with a smile as she turned to look at Henry.

"A week after you had twins via cesarean section?" Will asked with a raised eyebrow.

"One of the blessings of my physiology is the rather rapid rate at which my body recovers from trauma." She said with a shrug.

"Glad to hear it," he said with a grin.

"Will, may I have a word?" She asked, clasping her hands in front of her.

"Of course." He said, nodding, as Henry motioned to the door. "I'm gonna go."

"It was good to see you, Henry." Helen said with a small smile as he left.

"What's up?" Will asked as Henry left the room.

"I wanted to talk to you." She said, seriously.

"About what?"

"I need you to take the lead in the Sanctuary affairs for a while longer than I had first anticipated."

"Something wrong?" He asked, concerned.

She shook her head. "The last year has been rather eventful, and I need some time to process everything, and to bond with the twins. So, I've decided to go on Sabbatical."

He nodded, understandingly. "Everything working out with Druitt?" He asked after a moment.

"That's the other project I need time to focus on. I need to research a cure for his madness."

He didn't say a word.

"With the children as young as they are, and with his desire to make up for the last one hundred and twenty years, we've decided that it's time to see if there's a way to maintain his powers and keep him from going mad."

"How long are you going to work on it?"

She swallowed. "As long as it takes, Will."

"And you're just going to make the Sanctuary your second priority?"

She inhaled slowly. "I have more than a few regrets from my life, Will," she began. "And while I am not leaving the Sanctuary, I am willing to make the time to assure that my children do not feel like the only way they can prove their worth to me is through their work with the Sanctuary. If they desire to work with the Sanctuary, they are welcome, but...if they wish to have a...normal life..."

"We'll miss you, Magnus."

"This is still my home," she said with a smile. "And if you require my assistance, I will be here to render it."

"And you promise you're coming back?"

"I will still be the legal head of the Sanctuary," she said, seriously. "For...a year or so, I'm asking you to be the acting head."

"Then, I'm here for you, Magnus."

"Thank you, Will." She said with a smile as she turned to leave.

It was only a few moments before she returned to her quarters to hear the soft cries of her newborn twins. Helen walked into the room to find John gently rocking the twins in their bassinets.

"You seem somewhat out of place, Mr. Druitt," she teased.

He turned with a small smile. "Helen, don't mock me."

"Let me help," she said, walking over. "It's time for their feeding."

"Did you speak with Will?" He asked as she took Audrey into her arms and walked over to her mother's antique rocking chair that she'd retrieved from her storage rooms so that she could nurse the newborn.

"Yes," she said, nodding. "He's agreed to a one-year sabbatical."

"Helen, you love your work. You do not need to take the sabbatical."

She looked over at him. "John, I love you more. And I love our children. Taking a year to lay the foundation of love and trust between us and our children is worth it. And finding a way to keep you out of the grip of the Ripper is also worth it."

"If you change your mind, Helen," he began softly.

"Stop." She interrupted, touching his lips. "I could never change my mind. This is the way it was supposed to be from the beginning." She swallowed. "With only one glaring omission," she managed.

John looked down at the floor as they remembered their eldest daughter, silently. A moment passed before Helen looked down at the infant suckling at her breast. "Your sister, Ashley, was a spirited young woman," she began with a teary smile. "And even though I would love more than anything to have her back, if we hadn't lost her, your father and I would not have reunited in time to have you darling children."

John picked up Gregory before he walked over to sit beside her. He kissed her forehead, gently. "I ask only one promise, Helen."

"Oh?"

"That you tell us about Ashley. All of us."

Helen looked over at him as she nodded. "I promise, John. For the rest of my life, I will tell all of you about Ashley."

"Then I'll have to be here for the rest of your life." He promised, leaning in to kiss her lips gently as he intended to do for the rest of his natural life.


End file.
